MIL wants to see her son without her grandson & me

[Grxcegrxxn]

For a bit of context, myself & my partner have been together 4 years, we had our son 18 months ago. Partners mother has only seen our son twice. We have encouraged her to schedule a day to come & see us or we can travel to her, but she either cancels plans or just doesn’t show up. She missed our sons first birthday, didn’t see him over the Christmas break, even though she lives a few streets away. FIL sees our son regularly but always comes to ours alone without MIL. We’ve been in no contact with MIL for 10 months now but recently she has started getting FIL to communicate for her instead of just reaching out herself. FIL invited us to a bbq at their house, we agreed we’d go, then the day of FIL messages & says ‘mom recons it’s best to leave it, I think you and her need to chat face to face privately’. When my partner asked what about (assuming she was upset about something & wanted to talk it out) he responded ‘it’s nothing bad your mom just wants mom and son time with you away from everyone els’. Insinuating she wants to be alone with him away from myself & our son. Usually I wouldn’t be bothered if it was directed at me, BUT I don’t understand why she wants to be away from her grandson as well? Am I taking this too personal? :/

Your insinuating that MIL has gone NC because we’ve had our son young, but then you go on to say ‘NC is appropriate when someone’s behaviour is detrimental to your well-being’, can you please clarify how having our son young is detrimental to MIL’s well being for her to go no contact with us to begin with? BUT THEN you go on to say by myself & DP choosing to go no contact we’re ‘childish & petulant’? Don’t you think you’re being quite contradictory? By saying ‘MIL has chose to go no contact cause you both had a child young’ BUT if we choose to go no contact suddenly we’re ‘childish’? So MIL isn’t being childish & petulant by ignoring her son & grandson for 10 months? & I have to ask again, how is myself & DP having our son ‘detrimental to MIL’s well being’? I sense that you much be much older & aren’t used to people having babies in their 20’s, but in my generation this is considered the norm. I’m 24, I’m not exactly straight out of high school, I finished college, I worked, we both moved out together & then decided we were ready, stop acting as if it’s socially unacceptable to have children this young & it gives MIL reason to treat us like dirt.

& for those insinuating that DS was an accident simply based on myself & DP’s age, he wasn’t. I’ll state again if unclear, myself & DP are 24, we BOTH finished college, BOTH worked, moved out of our parents together & got our own place THEN decided to start a family because we were ready. I think a few commenters must assume I’m straight out of high school getting knocked up for lack of contraception. & also for more context, I was pregnant before we conceived our son (but it ended in miscarriage), but when we told his mother I was pregnant the first time she was actually delighted & invited DP & I & my parents to hers for dinner to all bond over the good news. But the second time round MIL seemed upset by the news as stated already, she ignored I was pregnant up until DS was born. Showed interest for the first 3 months of DS’s life then suddenly nothing since. So for those saying ‘maybe she just isn’t happy that DP is having a baby so young’, A. She fell pregnant before she finished high school so who is she to judge? & B. She was happy about the first pregnancy so wouldn’t make sense for her to be disappointed about the second pregnancy.

If your MIL needs to talk to her son, the socially smart thing to do would be for her to contact him and say 'I need to talk to you about something' and set up a meeting.
The socially manipulative thing to do is to invite you all to a barbeque and then use her husband to disinvite you.

Your DH needs to talk to his mother and get to the bottom of the problem.

yes 100%, if MIL came forward & asked DP himself he would talk it out with her then, but until then we aren’t going to continue to communicate with her through FIL, it’s not fair that he’s been put in the middle of it all having to pass messages back & forth. She’s grown, she can message him & let him know she wants to talk.

OP.
I'd love to have you as my DIL, you sound amazing. Sorry you are having to go through this. I don't believe it's you or DP or DS at all.

Another poster on here said she had
something similar re her DPs birthday and the penny dropped.

If you get time do some reading on line about dealing with mothers who have narcissist personality disorder. Their behavior doesn't make sense until you understand why they need behave that way to control the world as they see it. (I'm going through major stuff since losing my father and having to get to grips with all this re my DM) You cant solve this problem but it may help to explain why.

You can only deal with your feelings and actions on this not anyone else's. Just regrettfully withdraw with love and enjoy DP and DS she has helped create.

1. What the her reaction when you announced your pregnancy? - DP went to tell her without me as I went to tell my parents, DP said when he got there she was fine, asked how he was etc. till he told her I was pregnant, MIL allegedly (I say allegedly because I wasn’t there, simply going off of what DP has told me) looked disappointed & was on her laptop at the time so instead of entertaining the conversation she just turned back to her laptop & ignored him, DP then got the scan picture out & went to hand it to her & she pushed it away & said ‘I’m not interested son’, then she got up & stormed off upstairs, slamming the door behind her. FIL called DP into the kitchen & FIL claims he thought she may be upset because of how long we had left it without telling her (we made the mistake of telling everyone I was pregnant too early the first time & hated having to break the news to the family I’d miscarried so we chose to wait the full 12 weeks till we at least had a scan to confirm we were ‘out of the woods’ before announcing). She avoided us up until DS was born then broke her silence with DP by congratulating him on the birth of DS & asked when she can come & see him.

2.Was she interested in the pregnancy?

The first pregnancy, yes, she wanted to be very involved the first time around, she wanted to do the baby shower for us etc, was sharing her birth stories with me, she used to make jokes to my mom like ‘they’d be scrapping over the first grandchild’.
Pregnancy with my DS however, no, she completely avoided us throughout the whole pregnancy up until DS was born.

1. 3.Did she offer to buy anything for the baby? - She bought DS clothes once she got back in touch after DS was born & a shit load of nappies. But tbf we never really asked for anything, we were very keen to get everything ourselves so I suppose I can’t fault her for not offering to get any of the expensive things, it wasn’t her job to do that so we never expected anything like that.

4.Did she have expectations of DP like uni or travelling that family life will preclude?

Not that we know of, she never really took much interest in what DP did with his future, she doesn’t even remember what DP went to college to study. She may of had expectations as you say BUT she didn’t make DP aware of what she would of liked him to do or myself, I don’t think Iv ever heard her say ‘oh I would of liked you to of done this or done that.’, She does with DP’s brother, she put his brother into private school, she used to pay for a tutor to come to the house for his brother to revise for his exams, but DP says MIL never did things like that with him, she wasn’t as pushy with DP as she is with his brother to succeed.

Thank you so much for this lovely comment, it’s much appreciated at times like this. & yes I definitely need to do some research on that as I’m typically not used to this sort of behaviour, specially from in laws, Iv always managed to have good relations with past partners mothers, just unfortunately not this one. I’m so sorry to hear you’re going through something similar with your DM & I wish you all the best & again thank you so much for your comment.

OP agrees MIL went NC with them 10mths ago. I rest my case and shall leave you all to it.

I really do wish you well OP

I think she sounds self centred and just isn't a very nice person!

Not that we know of, she never really took much interest in what DP did with his future, she doesn’t even remember what DP went to college to study....she put his brother into private school, she used to pay for a tutor to come to the house for his brother to revise for his exams, but DP says MIL never did things like that with him, she wasn’t as pushy with DP as she is with his brother to succeed.

Bingo, there's the explanation. Your BIL is the Golden Child and your DH is the scapegoat.
How is the relationship between the two brothers?

Luckily DP & his brother get on well, his brother has occasionally tagged along with FIL when he visits, but not every time, probs on 2-3 occasions. DP was always left to look after him when MIL & FIL were working, DP was responsible for making his dinner, making sure he had done his homework, would clean his room for him so he wouldn’t get an earful from MIL & FIL cause he simply wouldn’t do it himself. DP took on all the chores (including his brothers so MIL & FIL wouldn’t go mad at his brother if it wasn’t done right. But apparently DP’s brother has been spending more time at his girlfriends recently & apparently FIL has barely seen him. & DP’s brother is definitely the golden child, I think I posted a comment the other day saying that DP seems to get special treatment, he gets PAID to do housework even though DP never did, he gets lifts from MIL to & from college & work & to his girlfriends but back when DP lived with them if he ever asked for a lift anywhere he always got told ‘you have legs, you can walk it’, despite the fact that DP was ran over when he was 11 walking home from school & was hospitalised. If DP’s brother needs to lend money they hand it over to him no problem, but if DP ever needed to lend money he’d get a solid no followed by a lecture about how to budget properly. They don’t even try to hide it at this point.

Dp’s brother seems to get special treatment*

Given MIL’s age, her excitement about your first pregnancy and the unexplained disinterest in your second pregnancy; do you think it’s possible that MIL has had a miscarriage around the time of your second pregnancy, and isn’t coping with the grief very well? Just one possibility.

Honestly though, there’s loads of things it could be, either decent legitimate explanations, or she’s just a horrible cow. Either way, it’s for your DP to figure out. I don’t think you getting offended on behalf of your son is worth the energy. Your child will build a relationship with those who spend time with him. She’s made her bed, leave her to lie in it, and focus your efforts and energy elsewhere. She isn’t your problem.